5 ms·

I don't think anyone has ever asked for face pics when they have hired men. On the one hand, I think it wouldn't be a bad idea to provide pics of the entire sta

• nickpsecurity 10y ago
  That impression crossed my mind. I'm not sure, though. Remember that a lot of people are visual thinkers that prefer to have a face and/or voice associated with a name. I'm one of them. I know what most YC people referenced in these articles look like given they have pics. The key men, esp sama or pg, usually had pics in many articles or stories so no need to ask for them. I'm interested in what she looks like for image-on-name even if not having one is ultimately inconsequential. That said, I'd be more interested in seeing how she looks, sounds, and approaches doing a marketing presentation or sales pitch. Given her track record, it would more accurately portray her in her YC role and I might even learn something. :)
  • Mz 10y ago
    One of the problems is that you can never be sure. I seem to be the highest karma woman on HN. I have had someone high on the leaderboard tell me he just does not see women treated differently here. I am clear I have been treated differently and I have worked extremely hard to shut down problematic kinds of attention, as well as bad habits on my end that I did not realize were a problem when I first showed up. Sexism usually presents itself not as some blatant and obvious different standard, but as a subtler pattern of behaviors. It ends up being maddeningly difficult to get other people to see it. In fact, it took me an extremely long time to conclude that my gender was a problem on HN because it is a remarkably well-behaved environment. I am only able to recognize certain issues because of experiencing the pattern more blatantly elsewhere. Yet, the reality is that I am a very prominent woman on HN and I remain extremely poor. The connection between my gender and my poverty seems blatantly obvious to me. I have extremely good reason to believe that if I were male, I would be taken far more seriously and people would promote my work. I would have more traffic, and that would result in more income and I would find it easier to get useful feedback. Of course, no one owes me any of that. But it is, nonetheless, a source of enormous frustration for me. Thus, I feel it matters that I speak out. No one seems to even notice the glaring example that the highest ranked woman here is desperately poor and homeless while the highest ranked men are all quite comfortable and I am reasonably confident that at least two of them are self-made millionaires. When there are as many self made millionaire women on the leaderboard as there are self made millionaire men, then you can tell me that remarks like the one above -- which is, happily, currently flagged to death-- are not an expression of sexism.
    • internals 10y ago
      Thank you for bringing attention to the remark as you did, and for sharing your own experience.
    • viraptor 10y ago
      > It ends up being maddeningly difficult to get other people to see it. Have you got some specific examples? I'm interested if it's simply that there are people who are sexist (that seems fairly obvious every few days, although it seems to be called out here more than in other places), or something you see on HN overall. (which I can't say I'm really aware of (apart from the technical work with woman's name on it always gets pointed out as something that a woman did)) > The connection between my gender and my poverty seems blatantly obvious to me. Have you ever tried/would you try using a gender-less persona behind what you're doing? (it's an actual question, not a suggestion) Assuming that's possible in your work - I don't think I ever read what it is that you do.
      • Mz 10y ago
        I am not willing to give specific examples of things on HN. That would involve talking about people here and that leads to all kinds of drama. I do blog about it sometimes. I try to do so in more general terms, to the best of my ability. On at least one occasion that I gave a specific example on my blog, it did turn into minor drama on HN. I did try doing the genderless persona thing when I first arrived. That doesn't work for me. I also think the suggestion amounts to admitting that there is no hope that women will ever get a fair shake, so just give up. Men are not told to hide their gender. Needing to hide my gender is also a de facto barrier to equal treatment. Do I need to change my legal name and try to disguise my gender if I meet someone in person for business reasons? A genderless online persona only works online. I can't reasonably present as genderless in person or even online if someone pays me for anything. I also am too well known at this point. I have multiple blogs. If I wish to go incognito, I would have to abandon all prior works and start from scratch on entirely unrelated projects. Furthermore, the details of my life are fairly unique. It would be enormously challenging to hide who I am. Anyone who recognizes me would pretty readily recognize me under a new handle. I have thought about it, quite a lot in fact. I believe that is a non-starter. Furthermore, I see progress on gender parity on HN. So, I think that's the way to bet: On further promoting gender parity here.